The present disclosure relates to an image processing device, an image processing method, and a computer-readable recording medium.
White light and narrow-band light are used for illumination light for illuminating the inside of a living body with an endoscope. Narrow-band light has different absorption/scattering characteristics depending on the wavelength band, and features of a subject depending on the wavelength band may thus be extracted by appropriately selecting narrow-band light to be used. For example, since blue narrow-band light is easily absorbed by hemoglobin, fine blood vessels on a superficial layer under a mucosa or the like clearly appear in a narrow-band image captured with use of blue narrow-band light. Changes in absorption occurring at the subject depending on such absorption/scattering characteristics of narrow-band light hardly appear in a white image captured with white light. Thus, generation of an image having features of both of a narrow-band image and a white image allows more detailed endoscopic observation.
For example, JP 2012-125461 A discloses combining an image captured with white light with an image obtained by applying frequency filtering to an image captured with white light to generate an image having features of both of the images.